Review: Acacia, the War with the Mein

An assassin sent from the frozen North on a mortal mission. A mighty empire under siege by its oldest enemy. Four royal children in exile or captivity, bent on avenging their father's death. Prepare yourself to be astonished and transported by Acacia.

Having read en enjoyed Durham’s solid historical novel ‘Hannibal’, I was more than a little curious to his first venture in the ‘epic’ fantasy realm: Acacia, the War with the Mein.

Mixed feelings about this one... Good thing was that I was immediately sucked into the world Durham created with his distinctive descriptive style. The story starts with an assassin, sent by the Mein - a race exiled about 20 generations ago to the uninhabitable, frozen north. He sets out to Acacia, the idyllic island named after the empire where King Leodan holds court. Leadon is an intelligent, sensitive and maybe even soft man. He lives for his four children, and has always protected them from the realities of the world; mainly the reality of where the wealth and position of the Akaran rule is based on. The empire is founded on slavery, the trafficking of drugs (called Mist) and the trading of a ‘Quota’ of children to an unseen peoples; the Lothar Aklun. Leodan would like to see things differently but is effectively powerless to change the reality of his world.

The book is set up in three parts. In the first part we see Leodan’s internal struggles and we get to know his children, his advisor and a general of the army. We also get introduced to the Mein and their motivations to conquer the known world and the steps towards this goal. In the second part the Mein rule and the children are young adults and scattered throughout the empire. The way this came to be is described through flashbacks. We will simultaneously get to know personalities and ‘new’ lives of the four Akarans. In the third part they have come to grips with their past and their destinies and the story comes to a conclusion.

The world building is done very well. We get a believable history, interesting cultural differences and we get introduced to the ‘ways of the world’ regarding the Mist and the Quota. (More than one parallel with the word we live in can be found in Durham’s world...) We can clearly see the beginnings of a much bigger story that can be told about the offstage parts of the world and its inhabitants. Lots of potential here!

But it is not a perfect book. One point of criticism is that the story was too light on dialogue to my taste. The descriptive style, although beautifully done, bogs done the flow of the story a bit. When there is dialogue it is as good as any writers, unfortunately there is not a whole lot of it. Rather than dialogue, there is whole lot of introspection going on, which gives us the info we need. That’s why I couldn’t begin to care much about any of the characters. Also, some actions of some characters either don’t make much sense (for instance the killing of a messenger early in the book), or seem contrived (the development and actions of Corinn in the last pages of the book come to mind).

Even with the negatives in mind I am pretty positive about this book. I like my fantasy ‘light’ – like an alternate history or a parallel world – but with a realistic feel and therefore not too heavy on the magic. There are magical elements here but they are not overdone. Durham’s style of writing and painting the picture of the world is beautifully done. I liked the moral ambiguity of some of the characters. The Mein chieftain was not just a villain and proved to be no worse a ruler than Leodan was. And even though I didn’t care for all the main characters a much as I should, I am still curious how they will develop in the future.

And, nothing to do with the story, the cover art is beautifully done. A big part of selling a book is marketing and presentation and it’s done perfectly here. I already saw the cover of the next book and for me it is impossible not to want this book on my shelve. Hideous cover art has prevented me from buying books in the past (I still want to read Tad Williams’ Memory, Sorrow and Thorn trilogy but I cannot buy these books with the ugly covers...) Acacia doesn’t have this problem.

Conclusion: Acacia, War with the Mein is a solid and enjoyable debut in the fantasy realm and allthough far from perfect holds big promise for future books.

7 / 10